


Bound and Determined

by Bow



Category: Mad Men
Genre: Gen, Yuletide, Yuletide 2010
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-19
Updated: 2010-12-19
Packaged: 2017-10-13 19:25:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/140826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bow/pseuds/Bow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Please don't let on that you knew me when I was hungry and it was your world.<br/>- Bob Dylan, "Just Like A Woman"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bound and Determined

**Author's Note:**

  * For [twincy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/twincy/gifts).



She comes into focus as Pete walks down the hallway: a blue dress with a collar, hands curled around a coffee cup, the crown of her head bent low over her desk.

He knocks at the frame of the open door and she raises her head.

"Peggy," he says, "can you tell me where we stand with the Hawaiian Visitors Bureau?"

She frowns and sits up straighter. "What's wrong? Did they move the meeting up? Nobody told me we were moving the meeting up."

"No," he says, "it's not that. But I have a call with them in an hour, and I'd like to give them an inkling of what they can expect."

"Oh, good. Because we're a little behind. Maybe you should tell them Creative needs to be flown in to do some on-site research--you know, for inspiration."

"I should, should I?" He smiles. "Do I tell Creative how to do _their_ jobs?"

"It was a joke, Pete." She looks thoughtful for a moment. "But yes. You do, actually."

"I knew it was a joke," he says quickly. "I'm sure I don't have to tell you, the HVB would be a major account for us. It could get attention. It--"

"I know. Don's already tried to scare me about it. Anyway, I can tell you what we have so far. You can come in and sit down, you know."

She steps out from behind her desk to lean against the front of it.

"Here's what I think: most people have this idea of Hawaii as this exotic, glamorous destination, but it can be more than that. It's not just girls in grass skirts and coconut bras," she says, and meets his eye. "There's another side to it. It's romantic. It could be good for families. It's a place where you can make memories that you'll be able to look back on forever. I was thinking we could format the print ads like postcards. You send one to Grandma, one to your friends at the office--and it's just a four-cent domestic postcard stamp, because it's still part of America, even though it's so far away. And then afterward it becomes a record to remember the trip by. I think it could be very--accessible."

"Very accessible," he repeats with a nod.

"Oh," she says, "and recipes. This morning I put Stan and Clara in the break room with a case of canned pineapple and half a grocery store aisle. I told them not to come out until they've invented three possibilities that could be published in Ladies' Home Journal."

"Right," says Pete, "I was wondering why the hallway smelled like onions. Do you think they could work baked beans into it somehow? It might help convince Heinz we're serious about earning their business."

"Pete! That's disgusting." She screws up her face, then relaxes it again. "Wait, was that a joke?"

"If you like." He smiles. "I think it's great, Peggy. And I think they'll go for it."

"You do?"

"I think it's great. Where did you come up with the idea about the postcards?"

Peggy shrugs and looks down at her coffee. "I don't know. I just think about things until they come to me."

***

Peggy shuts the door behind him and settles back into her chair. She glances out the window and thinks about the artwork for the campaign. There should be an ad with a picture of an older couple under an umbrella on the beach, one of a family with two children in the ocean, there should be a young couple in love. On the back side of a memo she pencils slogans until lunch.

***

It's already dark when Pete leaves the office. He rushes toward the closing elevator, and the doors shudder back open to reveal Peggy. Underneath her pea coat her blue dress is the same, but her makeup is darker and her earrings are bigger.

"They actually did it," she says to him, shaking her head. "They came up with the idea on their own, even. Two cans of baked beans, one can of pineapple, a cup of cubed ham, and part of an onion. They're calling it Beans Hawaiian Style. Stan swore it tasted good, but I have to tell you: I don't think anything that looks or smells like that could help you land Heinz."

"Well, just as long as the ham is Sugarberry. Will there be samples at the meeting?"

"No food. Definitely no food. Just recipe cards...and maybe some Floating Island Punch."

The elevator opens with a soft ding, and she enters the lobby in front of him.

"Shall I walk you to the train?" Pete asks, and she glances at him over her shoulder.

"Okay."

He matches her pace, and it feels almost strange to walk beside her--like they're friends, which maybe they are. He holds the door to the building for her and they step together into the evening. "Plans tonight?"

"A concert," she says. "In the Village. What about you?"

"I'm afraid not--Tammy is teething."

"Oh. Right." On the corner, at the entrance to the downtown F, Peggy pauses. "Goodnight, Pete," she says to him.

"Goodnight." He watches the back of her head disappear down the stairwell. When she's gone, he turns and hails a cab going up Sixth.

As they make a right onto 52nd, he thinks about her waiting on the platform, staring into the tunnel with that plain, intent look in her eyes. He thinks about her sitting on the train, straight-backed with her hands clasped in her lap. There was a time that she would have blushed when she mentioned the coconut bras, he is sure. But years have passed since then, and he feels how far he is now from the time when he knew her.

It's not until the driver asks him which building that Pete realizes they're crossing 82nd. He points to the ivory awning ahead and reaches for his billfold. From the cab he can see the windows of his apartment, with his wife and child waiting for him inside. He steps out onto the sidewalk, under the awning, past the doorman, and back into the life that he has built for himself.

***

The conference room, empty but for Peggy, is set like a stage. The chairs sit vacant around the table; the ad mock-ups lean patiently against their easels. She peers over the silver ice bucket and uses the lid as a mirror.

She hears Pete's voice first, gazing in the direction of the sound until he comes into view. He is walking between the two executives, ushering them toward her, laughing and joking and looking like the effort costs him nothing. The men enter and they shake hands all around.

Pete grins and cedes the floor to her. She stands at the head of the table and looks down at the rows of expectant faces. The nerves make her heart beat faster, but if there is a better place for her, if there is somewhere she belongs more than here, she doesn't know it.

And if there is still a part of Peggy that remembers a postcard from Niagara Falls buried in a desk drawer--a part of her that was convinced its author was the ticket to a better world, and a part that pored over his handwriting on the back like it was a code that might tell her how to get there--well, she knows now that there are other worlds, and other paths to them. Peggy knows how quickly the past can fall away from you, how swiftly these things recede, until no one can be sure they ever existed at all.


End file.
